Paul Kirk
A senior Durban municipal officer allegedly used a fake driver’s licence to obtain an official luxury car, traffic officials confirmed this week.
The acting chief executive of the south operating entity of the Durban Unicity Council, Sandile Thusi, is also alleged to have channelled hundreds of thousands of rands worth of council contracts to his own companies.
This week the Mail & Guardian obtained a copy of the driver’s licence Thusi submitted to his employers when he obtained a 3-series BMW. The copy shows that he holds a code 8 driver’s licence issued on July 17 1989.
However, when this document was shown to a traffic officer, he said it was “clearly an amateurish forgery using Letraset [letter transfers]”.
A search of official driver’s licence records shows Thusi obtained his driver’s licence only on October 13 1998 nine years later.
Asked to comment, Thusi said: “So what? You are a fucking racist and no African worth anything would ever talk to you or your paper. It is commonly known that your newspaper and your boss want to bring back apartheid. It is commonly known you are a bunch of pigs thrown out of Vlakplaas for being too stupid. Write anything and this municipality will sue you out of existence.”
Thusi exploded into a rage when asked about his directorship of two companies that have huge contracts from his municipality.
According to a company search, Thusi is a director of the Centre for Community and Labour Studies and a company called Vukuzakhe. These companies have received payments exceeding R240 000 from the South Operating Entity as part of its Masakhane campaign.
Asked to explain this, Thusi initially said he had resigned these directorships some time ago. However, when told the Registrar of Companies record show the directorships were still current, he launched into a tirade.
Said Thusi: “You are dealing with a senior municipal official. Who do you think you are to even presume I will talk to you anymore? This has bugger all to do with you. If you want to speak to me you will do it in writing and you will not waste my fax paper. You will post your questions to me.”
Thusi is also responsible for deciding whether to discipline another council official who faked a degree in order to secure a job. The official has not yet been disciplined.
Arnold Shange has no educational qualifications other than a matric certificate to hold his R400 000-a-year job as health director. Last month the M&G exposed his B Juris degree as having been fraudulently obtained. His degree has been withdrawn by the University of Zululand.
Shange’s rise has been meteoric. He went from the position of clerk allocating houses to families in a suburb of Amanzimtoti to health director in just a few months despite not being registered with the South African Medical and Dental Council as a health professional, as most officials in his position are.
Shange remains in his position despite a Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration ruling that his appointment was unreasonable considering his complete lack of experience and relevant qualifications especially compared to the man who previously held his position, George Lithgow, who was sidelined.